STABILITY AND INSTABILITY FACTORS OF MULTINATIONAL DEMOCRACIES: THEORETICAL ASPECTS AND EMPIRICAL EVIDENCE
DOCTORAL PROGRAM IN POLITICAL SCIENCE SPS/04
XXVI
CANDIDATE: Maja Ajdin
TUTOR: DIRECTOR:
To Nađa
“May your life be like a wildflower growing freely in the beauty and joy of each day.”
CHAPTER I
DEMOCRACY, NATIONALITY AND STATENESS
INTRODUCTION
1. Evolution of the concept democracy 2. Definition of democracy
3. “Ethnic origin” of nations 4. Nationality and citizenship 5. Stateness
6. Nationalism and Democracy
CHAPTER II
CONSOCIATIONAL DEMOCRACY, FEDERALISM AND POWER SHARING 1. Consociational theory and practice
2. Federalism and its features 3. Territory
4. Symmetrical and asymmetrical arrangements 5. Successful case of managing diversities: Switzerland
CHAPTER III
DIMENSIONS OF MULTINATIONAL POLITICS
1. Group interaction and balance of power in multinational politics 2. Political parties and multiparty system
3. Cross-cutting cleavages 4. Size and democracy
5. Electoral systems in multinational countries a) Conceptual overview
b) Electoral system classification c) Proportional electoral system d) PR electoral system and democracy
e) PR system: proportionality and disproportionality
CHAPTER IV
BELGIUM: CONSTITUTIONAL EVOLUTION AND POLITICAL INSTABILITY
Introduction
1. Historical and Political Overview
2. Constitutional arrangements and Reforms of state a) I Reform of State
b) II Reform of State c) III Reform of State d) IV Reform of State e) V Reform of State f) VI Reform of State
4. Form of government
5. Political Parties in Belgium
6. Factors that influenced stability and instability of Belgium Conclusions
CHAPTER V
SPAIN: DEMOCRACY AND ACCOMMODATION OF DIVERSITY
1. Historical overview
2. Constitutional evolution in Spain
3. The first elections and the stateness issue 4. Federalism in Spain
5. Asymmetry in Spain
6. Estado des Autonomias: conceptual overview and empirical evidence 7. Statues of Autonomy and political parties
a) Regional segmentation of political parties b) Party System
c) Electoral system
d) Political parties and the “nationalisation” of regions 8. Final considerations
INTRODUCTION
The present analysis is an attempt to examine normative concepts about multinational democracy and political recognition, and a contextually-sensitive empirical analysis of the Spanish and Belgian case. Multinational democracies are fragile systems and occasionally the are facing periods of crisis or political deadlock.
Several quests are posed about the stability of democracies with such an arrangement. Consociational arrangement was proposed as the most suitable for divided countries. However, consociativisim has produced several positive and many negative results throughout the recent history. Consociational theory has been developed with the aim to explain stability of states with multinational component.
The analysis will be developed in several stages and it will begin with the illustration of the concept of democracy. Consequently and in relation to democratic principles it will be examined the notion of ethnicity, nationality by underling the difference between these last two concepts.
The consociational democracy will be analyzed in its main features.
The aim of the research is the exploration of a suitable framework for the political inclusion of different national groups through the process of recognition, accommodation and representation. Territorial arrangement, electoral systems and political parties will be examined in the light of their relation to multinational countries.
The focus will be on the conditions under which a multinational state can function democratically and specifically which are the factors favor stability of deeply divided democracy
What concerns this work is to find the most suitable pattern for different national groups’ accommodation within the state. Consequently and unavoidably it is of enormous importance to understand how the states face and cope with the accommodation of several national groups, trying to preserve, at the same time, unity and stability of the country.
Electoral systems will be part of this analysis as they represent one of the most powerful instruments that support consensus democracies, with relation to party systems, representation of the groups in legislatures, and the stability of democratic arrangements.
The two empirical cases, Belgium and Spain will be examined in their constitutional arrangement, territorial organization, party system and electoral system in order to understand what kind of obstacles can threaten stability and unity of these two countries.
CHAPTER I
DEMOCRACY, NATIONALITY AND STATENESS
1. Evolution of the concept democracy
Democracy as concept has had a long evolution since its first forms and practices.
The term comes from the Greek word dēmokratía and it was coined from demos (people) and krátos (power),1 or kratein2 as used by Aristotle. For the precise definition of the exact meaning of democracy in Ancient Greece a semantic excursus is needed, but for the purposes of this work it will be used the commonly accepted definition of the ancient term as a “rule of people”.
A very careful analysis is needed when we accept the meaning of krátos that Greeks attributed to a segment in a society. By the meaning this word can be interpreted also as force and in the ancient meaning and conception they were attributing what we today define as sovereignty.3 Considering the atheniese practice, this first form of democracy has influenced the further political philosophy and has represented the first form of participation to the political life of a citizen. However, the concept of politics, political community and of participation was completely different of what we conceive today. The idea of political community was comprehensive of all other spheres including the economical, religious and moral sphere. The antique concept of freedom cannot be compared with nowadays definition considering that the atheniense freedom was coinciding with the participation to the political life and the notion individual freedom was far away from being regarded as a value.4
Three main aspects essentially influenced the evolution of democratic practice: the enlargement of the polity, the increasing specialization of political functions and the new concept of freedom. Today governments are states, their geographic and demographic sizes are much bigger than Greek cities, the politics domain is wider and it is connected to all other spheres of the state activity and the concept of freedom is completely changed. Considering the size of the states, from the point of view of their geographical size and population, the concept of the direct
1 Dahl, R., On Democracy, New Heaven, Yale University Press, 1998, p.11
2 Schumpeter, J.A., Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, Taylor & Francis e-Library, London, 2003, p. 243
3 Bearzot, C., Un’ideologia del federalismo nel pensiero politico greco?, in “Federazioni e federalismo nell’Europa
antica” (Atti del Convegno Bergamo, 21-25 settembre 1992), Milano 1994, 161-180
democracy during the modern age, as defined by Sartori was not possible anymore.5 The modern democracy was based on representative principle, where the exercise of power was assigned to the representatives of the people.6
Constant has made a distinction between the modern and ancient concept of liberty that, as a general notion, as at the basis of democracy. He argued that the modern concept is based mainly on “the right to be subjected only to the laws […], the right of each person to express his opinion, […], the right of each person to associate with other individuals, each person’s right to have some influence on the administration of the government—by electing all or some of the officials, or through representations.”7 However, the liberty of ancients consisted “in carrying out collectively but directly many parts of the over-all functions of government, coming together in the public square.”8
Therefore, according to Constant, the liberty of ancients was based on collective and, overall, direct participation to the functions of the government.
However, this was not the only reason that changed the concept of democracy during the modern age, but it was due also to modern changed concept of politics and political functions. In Satori’s words, the massification of the politics has created a complex “inversion of perspectives”. The politics, exclusive competence of the state, became more complex and structured.9
The concept of freedom was subjected to a massive evolution considering that Athenians, which were all equal citizens by having the same right to participate to the political life, they could enjoy their freedom by exercising their sovereign functions. Nowadays, the equality and freedom could be accomplished by exercising direct and indirect participation, free and fair information and responsible and responsive government.10
After the French Revolution, and particularly at the end of the nineteenth century, many policies aimed to craft a unitary homogeneous nation-state that would include only one cultural and political identity. In case of France, the French language was the only accepted language in the
5 Sartori, G., Elementi di teoria politica, il Mulino, Bologna, 1995, p.41 6 Ibidem, pag.41
7 Constant, B., The Liberty of the Ancients Compared with that of the Moderns, lecture to the Athénée Royal of Paris in 1819. Available on http://www.nationallibertyalliance.org
8 Ibidem
9 Sartori, G., op. cit., pag.272
state. The manifestation of any regional cultural differences was unacceptable and the only commonly accepted idea of a democratic state was a homogeneous, unitary state.
Therefore since the end of the 19th century, when the first modern democratizations took place the states struggled continuously in order to fulfil normative prescriptions.However, principles pursued by the democratic states in the past have changed over the time and across the space. Nevertheless two principles, freedom and equality, have always symbolized significant objectives for democratic statesmen and citizens. The ideals of equality and freedom have continuously been believed to be essential and indispensable. The conceptualisation of these principles, as the conceptualisation of democracy, have changed throughout the centuries.
First of all, as Sartori pointed out, the term democracy is misleading for the descriptive purposes of the concept. The term denotes “how democracy should be” which is different from what it is in reality. The term refers to an ideal-type that is further away from the democracy in practice. The practised democracy is different from a normative concept of itself. 11
According to Hansen the principle of equality was conceived as sameness, uniformity, while nowadays it is conceived as equality of opportunities. The Athenians eleutheria was the notion of political freedom, but in philosophers’ understanding eleutheria was perceived as a status of being free and not being a slave. According to Aristotle democrats assumed that they are all eleuthoroi (free by descent) and consequently they should be equal in everything.12
In Dahl’s definition democracy is narrowly connected with the notion of equality of individuals within the polity. The principle of equality is fulfilled when individuals are also legal persons and citizens of the country that brings in addition its obligations and rights that originate from the membership to a country. As a result, the equality is defined as equality of rights and obligations in all the fields of social life.13 He also points out that countries where the population have no enough capabilities to express their freedom and equality, referring explicitly to economic possibilities, democracy is quite impossible.
However, freedom and equality mean different things to different thinkers.
11 Sartori, G., Democratic Theory, Democratic Theory, Westport, Greenwood Press, 1973
12 Hansen, M. H., Democratic Freedom and the Concept of Freedom in Plato and Aristotle, Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies 50 (2010)
According to J. Roland Pennock democracy "is much more than a technique of government. It is a technique that reflects certain values notably those of individual liberty and equality”.14 Similarly, Mayo and Lipson have developed models of democracy characterized, in their prescriptive dimension, by freedom and equality and, in their descriptive component, by citizen control of leaders.15
Moreover in theory it is possible to make a distinction between the leftist and rightist thoughts in equality that acquire different connotations. In that context democratic equality cannot mean equality in everything and there are also many inequalities that democracy does not deal with. For Dahl, it is the logic of "political" equality that represents one important factor affecting the development of democratic institutions and ideas. Dahl defines the logic of political equality as the belief that "all the members of the association are adequately qualified to participate on an equal footing with the others in the process of governing the association," and that "no single member, and no minority of members, is so definitely better qualified to rule that the one or the few should be permitted to rule over the entire association."16
However, democratic equality is not intended to make all people equal in all dimensions. Dahl argues only a democratic government is fully coherent with the logic of political equality. According to Dahl, there are five criteria that mark a democratic process: voting equality, effective participation, enlightened understanding, control of the agenda, and inclusion of all adult members in collective decisions. Violation of any of these conditions not only would make the process undemocratic, but also it would be discordant with the principle of political equality. For example, "[t]o deny any citizen adequate opportunities for effective participation means that because their preferences are unknown or incorrectly perceived, they cannot be taken into account. But to not take their preferences toward the final outcome equally into account is to reject the principle of equal consideration of interests" and this is a deduction of the logic of political equality.17 Nevertheless the logic of political equality itself does not delineate its scope, which must be defined by further criteria of democracy.18
14 Griffith, E., Plamenatz J., and Pennock, R., Cultural Prerequisites to a Successfully Functioning Democracy: A
Symposium, The American Political Science Review Vol. 50, No. 1 (Mar., 1956)
15 Mayo, H., An Introduction to Democratic Theory, New York, Oxford University Press, 1960), p.60 ff; Lipson, L., The
Democratic Civilization, New York, Oxford University Press, 1964, p. 73.
16 Dahl, R., Democracy and its Critics. Yale University Press, 1991. pag.31 17 Ibidem, pag. 109
Sartori stated that "[i]nequality is 'nature'; equality is denaturalization.” In terms of their relationship with democracy, according to Sartori, some equalities preceded democracy, while others are democratic claims. Pre-democratic equalities included some indisputable rights, and equal freedom or moral equality. These equalities are more the results of times when they were shaped such as religion (Christianity), ethics, natural law and liberal ideals than of democracy. In contrast, three other equalities stand out as distinctively democratic demands: full political equality (as equal universal suffrage), social equality (as equal status and consideration regardless of class or wealth), and equality of opportunity (as equal access and equal start). It is easier to defend social and political equality and equality of opportunities because these equalities rest on basic moral and ethical values and do not engage too much state involvement (particularly, they do not involve wealth redistribution), and therefore are well-accepted principles in liberal democracies. It is harder, however, to justify equality of opportunity as equal start (for example, equal initial material conditions for equal access to opportunities), because equal start (as defined by Sartori) involves wealth redistribution and equalization of circumstances.19
Both Rousseau20 and Sartori point to the fact that liberty, by itself, does not guarantee all equalities human kind aspire to have. "Modern democracy seeks, thus, a set of 'just equalities' that do not follow spontaneously in the wake of freedom".21 In between several forms of equality not all of them are democratic claims or are compatible with democracy. Different forms of equality have different bases, means and purposes.
Salvadori for example identifies liberty as the core value of political association. He writes: "nothing, not peace, not happiness, not prosperity is as important for all men as liberty."'
However it would be wrong to identify democracy with liberty. Democracy refers to “institutions through which freedom of the members of politically organized community is realized”.22 Sartori, in relation to liberty and equality, is quite sharp on difference between democracy and “liberal democracy”. He believes that “to isolate liberalism from democracy, we say that liberalism calls for liberty and democracy for equality. To unite them we say that it is the task of liberal-democratic systems to combine liberty with equality.”23
19 Sartori, G., The Theory of Democracy Revisited, Chatham, New Jersey: Chatham House, 1987, p.345 20 Rousseau, J. J., The Basic Political Writings, Indianapolis, Hackett, 1987
21 Sartori, G., Op. cit., 1987, pag.344
22 Salvadori, M., Liberal Democracy, Garden City, Doubleday & Co., 1957, p. 20. 23 Sartori, G., op.cit., 1987, p.383
Contemporary democratic theory defines a competitive political environment as a system in which various leaders and organizations define the issues and contend for public support. Democratic politics, in other words, develops in a fundamentally pluralistic context. A democratic society is one in which power is divided between political parties and groups; no single entity should be allowed to monopolize power.
However, nowadays what is the democracy? Through the time democracy has changed and moreover the structure of the society changed. What is the relation between the democracy practiced by the states and democracy described by scholars?
2. Definition of democracy
Contemporary theory stipulates a set of prerequisites for arise and survival of democracy. Sartori describes democracy in its empirical dimension as "a political system in which the influence of majority is assured by elective and competitive minorities to whom it is entrusted.”24 In its normative aspect, democracy is equated with equality.
Schumpeter gives a definition in terms of leadership and competition in a pluralistic political environment. The primary function of the people, he argues, is not to decide issues but it is "to produce a government." 25
Currently the definition of democracy became very difficult even if it is a very ancient concept. The term is applied on variety of realities and practices that makes difficult an exact, punctual, precise formulation of the concept. Different contexts on which democracy is applied change the connotation of concept itself. Therefore the risk is to stretch the concept of democracy and lose the essence of the core concept. Other problematic issue is that proliferation of conceptual definitions that creates different adjectives and sub-types of the concept of democracy.26
On the other hand, scholars have the aim to describe as many as possible the variety of “democratic arrangements” emerged in last decades. Consequently, it is a hard task trying not to stretch the concept and still aiming to describe wide range of democratic arrangements. As Collier and Levitsky analysed there are more than 550 sub-types of democracy. Some of these
24 Sartori op. cit., Sartori's definition of democracy is developed in a series of stages.
25 Schumpeter, J.A., Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy, Taylor & Francis e-Library, London, 2003
26 Collier, D., Levitsky, S., Democracy “with adjectives”: Conceptual Innovation in Comparative Research, World Politics, Vol. 49 (3), Apr., 1997
sub-types represents distinctive institutional elements, or features of full or “diminished” democracy.27
Nevertheless, these concepts and formulations used by scholars are applied on different realities and in connection to a certain scientific goal or research direction. For this reason democracy has variety of adjectives that depend on the context and the goal of research. It causes a creation of a large range of conceptual innovations and concept stretching.
Sartori has also emphasized that even if several political theories emerged in last centuries, democracy had never been specifically related with one of the political streams, such as, for example, socialism or communism. He points out that democracy is union of ideals as it denotes a political system created as a result of the development of the Western society. Furthermore, as long as democracy became universally accepted system, the concept itself was subjected to theoretical fading.28 He also adds that by using an inadequate word to describe a concept is definitely misleading and confusing for the whole concept. Democracy should be categorized with all its principles on more rational ground and consequently examined why it can be implemented or cannot be realized at all.
Beetham asserted that democracy “may need to be diluted in this or that practical context depending upon the range of constraints and opportunities which present themselves with regard to the organization of politics in that context.”29
The properties of democracy can be established after democracy has been conceptualized adequately. From time to time democratic adjective is used for some countries even if only limited procedures and practices are presumingly democratic, creating a misleading concept of democracy itself. However for the scientific purposes that is called definitional fallacy.
Definition of democracy taken by general assumption, described from a set of principles based for the most part on experience or experimental evidence from the practice of any country or political entity would be completely misleading and wrong. Democracy is a set of procedures and practices that can vary from one country to another and this democratic dynamics is always
27 Diamond, L., The End of the Third Wave and the Global Future of Democracy, IHS Political Science Series No. 45, July 1997
28 Sartori G., Democrazia e definizioni, Bologna, Il Mulino, 1969, p. 321, cited in L. MORLINO, Democrazie, in G. Pasquino (ed), Manuale di scienza politica, Bologna, Il Mulino, 1986, p. 86.
under developing process. Therefore, assumptions created by induction in order to create a general rule are completely distorted and deceptive.
However, from the observation of the democratic practice in many countries it can be concluded that democracy has frequently been far from the ideal type. The difference between what democracy is in theory and what it should be in practice has always represented the major engine for its development.30
Ryan argued that: “it’s no use defining democracy in terms of the politics of any particular country, for then we can no longer praise that country for being democratic – we cannot praise a society for qualities which belong to it by definition rather than by political contrivance”.31 For example, in contemporary democracies citizens are holders of the political power in a way that they elect their representatives and exercise some instruments of direct democracy. But they also have their individual rights and liberties and in these they should be threated as free and equal and no constrain should come from the state. Politics provides only general norms and within these legal borders, people act autonomously and freely.32
The democratic axiom “rule by people” is extremely vague and is open to highly diverse interpretations.33 Democracy is certainly predominantly characterized by freely expressed will of the people, by the idea that all individuals are to be treated equally, by an inclusive citizenship and by political equality and popular sovereignty.34
Sartori in his conceptualizing of democracy, besides the majoritarian rule and participation, included also “equality, freedom, consensus, coercion, competition, pluralism, constitutional rule, and more”.35 As Beetham pointed out the popular control is strengthened by the people as self-determining agents who participate actively to the political life and have the right to express issues that affect their lives. Also every individual should have equal rights and capacity for self-determination and consequently the equal right to influence collective decisions.
30 Sartori, G, How Far Can Free Government Travel?, Journal of Democracy, Vol.6 (3), 1995 31 Ryan, A., The philosophy of the social sciences, Macmillan, London, 1970, pag.29
32 Fisichella, D, Lineamenti di scienza politica: concetti, problemi, teorie, Roma, Carocci, 1998, p. 281
33 Hadenius, A., Democracy and Development, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1992; Held, D., Models of
Democracy, Polity, Cambridge, 1987, Lively, J., Democracy, Blackwell, Oxford, 1975
34 Beetham, D., Key Principles and Indices for a Democratic Audit, p28., in Definining and Measuring Democracy, D. Beetham (ed.), Sage, London, 1994
O’Donnell in his work, adopting a thicker description of democracy, explains the difficulties of defining the notion of certain aspects of the state (and of the regime).36 He asserts that aspects of the state are “a territorial entity that delimits those who are the carriers of the rights and obligations of political citizenship and legal system that enacts and backs the universalistic and inclusive assignment of these rights and obligations”.37 He points out that democratic theory needs to go beyond the mere focus on electoral liberties and must take in consideration the idea of the state as a legal system, it must include a “historically oriented political sociology of democracy. He also adds that an analysis of democracy cannot include only aspects regarding the regime, but it must be examined with reference to the state, to its legal system and to several elements of the social context.38
Therefore, the process of classification of the concept cannot be coined only in theoretical isolation, but it has to be embedded in practice in order to validate the concept. One of the most important democratic principles is equality of all citizens in a democratic state. Consequently they all have same rights and all should be treated equally in specific political context. As Sartori precised these democratic parameters should be considered in relation to the context. In stable and strong democracies such as Anglo-american or Scandinavian models the maximization of equality is the ultimate goal. On the other hand, in democracies that do not have strong and durable basis, the parameters are restricted and the aspect that becomes of fundamental importance is liberty.39
Claims that a person or a minority group should rule a political community – that is, a group of “individuals who need to make at least some binding collective decisions - without being democratically chosen can be based upon many foundations, notably sex, age, class, race, religion, military strength and knowledge. Most of these demands can be reduced to a common form of claim: that a specific group of people, claim the right to lead the community because of their specific (“superior”) characteristics”.40
36 O’Donnell, G., Democracy, Law and Comparative Politics, Studies in Comparative International Development, Spring 2001, Vol. 36 (1).
37 Ibidem 38 Ibidem
39 Sartori, G., Elementi di teoria politica, il Mulino, Bologna, 1987, p.47
40 Saward, M., Democratic theory and indices of democratization, in Beetham, D., ed., Defining and Measuring Democracy. Modern Politics, London, Sage, 1994, pp. 6–24.
In this context also Walzer pointed out that “all arguments for exclusive rule, all anti-democratic arguments”.41 He also argues that political power representa a field of social activity qualitatively different from other spheres. Political power is a particular kind of good. It has a dual nature. Initially it is as other goods that people create, value, trade and share; as all other divisible good sometimes is held by few or otherwise it is the possession of the few. On the other side, the political power is different from all the other goods because, whoever has it, political power is the regulative agency for all social goods generally.42 Politics is not 'just' about the nature and the different sorts of political claims within different spheres of activity constituted around certain social goods; it is also about the multifaceted relationships between these separated spheres. It is intricate research in order to understand the complexity of politics in a given space and time. Politics has to deal also with the nature of different types of political claims that are originated from distinct areas of society and it has to manage intricate relationships among them.
Nevertheless, when certain claims are originated from different constitutionally relevant national groups, in order to act democratically, the state has to act starting with the assumption that all citizens are equal and that the totality of the population has right to decide, by democratic means, the appropriate political course of their community. This could be defined as 'equality assumption'. The equality assumption arises from the fact that there are no elements upon which some groups could have the privilege to rule the rest. It has to be taken as the core definition of democracy within the theory of democracy. Consequently the general rule that can rationally be a result of the equality assumption is that policy and political and administrative actions must be compatible to the articulated preferences of a majority of citizens. There should be indispensable equivalence between acts of government and the expressed will of citizens with respect to those acts (responsive rule). Therefore the simple majority rule is preferable to any of alternatives: minority rule, qualified majority rule or unanimous rule. However, a range of prerequisites must be met before it is effectively achieved. Besides the empirically necessary conditions, the logically necessary requirements refer to rights, freedoms and decision mechanisms. All the requirements originate from the equality assumption and the responsive rule definition. The basic freedoms
41 Walzer, M., Spheres of Justice: a Defense of Pluralism and Equality, New York, Basic Books, 1983, p.285
42 See also Rotberg, R., Failed States, Collapsed States, Weak States: Causes and Indicators, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2003
reproduce the requirements originating from the equality assumption. Participation conditions and citizenship reflect the need for minimal rights and specified mechanisms essential to the maximization of responsive rule.
Nevertheless we face situations where within the population of the same state there are groups having different believes, preferences or ethnic belonging and in a political system these differences might provoke clashes and dissonances and also could undermine governments of some states. Nowadays all autonomous democratic state could be defined multicultural at some level. Undoubtedly they should be divided in different categories according to the degree of cultural diversity and according to the influence of different ethnic groups. In case of a polity where there is one national group that considers itself as a nation and the members of the group share the same language, religion, culture and history the nation-building and democratization process can go side by side and reinforce one another.43 However in case of a polity that includes different ethnic groups and the democratization process is about to be introduced by, as usually it is, competitive elections, the state building and democratization process could find several obstacles. The main problem is introduced by different groups who want to govern and all of them claim to be “more privileged” than others in the state-building process.
There are many reasons why states can fail to fulfil democratic principles and may fail. Lately the practice and consequently the theory has been overwhelmed of cases where states weren’t able to establish democratic principles, not even basic ones, and where democracies have been threatened. Among the most common reasons were entrenched elites, the lack of cultural and social requisites and inadequate institutions. Nevertheless one of the main reasons of the failure of the democracy or of the democratization process in most cases and in many countries was the existence of an ethnic conflict in any form.44 As Horowitz has pointed out, some countries with smallest number of serious cleavages, like Hungary, the Czech Republic, and Poland, achieved democratic process in less time than other countries such as Slovakia, Bulgaria, Romania, and the former Yugoslavia. While the first group of countries have had some democratic traditions the second one have showed “a direct relationship between ethnic conflict and nondemocratic development.”45 Democracy can open the road to many different expression of ethnicity and
43 Stepan, A., Linz, J., Yadav, Y., Crafting State-Nations, India and Other Multinational Democracies, Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010
44 Horowitz, D., Democracy in divided societies, Journal of Democracy, Vol. 4 (4), 1993 45 Ibidem
therefore can also “facilitate either majority rule and the exclusion of minorities or minority rule and the exclusion of majorities. Things can be done -for some deeply divided societies are relatively democratic--but there are good systemic reasons why it is difficult to produce institutions conducive to the emergence of multiethnic democracy.”46
It is important to speculate about the democracy as a system in which inclusion and participation are among the main ones. Inclusion and consequently exclusion are related with the access to the power, resources, about the privilege to be part of the political community. The principle of is very close to freedom and equality, the two main axiomatic characteristics of democracy, and frequently it can be in contrast with them, for the reason that inclusion may possibly be only partial and for certain groups determined by certain characteristics.
The principle of inclusion, nowadays, is closely related to the state arrangement in divided societies. If we take in consideration model settled by Linz and Stepan47 concerning five arenas of modern consolidated democracies we can clearly see how the political, civil and economic sphere are closely related and interaction is strictly necessary. Democracy is not only a set of values and it is not only a regime. It is an elaborated mechanism of interaction between different systems composing a state apparatus. In other words, a democratic state is an interactive system between stateness (rule of law, state apparatus), civil society (which can be composed of a nation or different nations or ethnic groups), political society and economic society. Nevertheless, a great number of states are multiethnic or multinational and the history had witnessed and still is witnessing the breakdown of many states or the fail of the democratization process caused by interethnic or inter-national partitions. Among the all cleavages considered in theory so far, the ethnic cleavage emerged very late in relation to other cleveages and to the development of the party systems.48 According to that, even if we can argue that a party system of a deeply divided country reproduce the ethnic division of that country, the dynamics and the relations between ethnic groups and political parties deserve a deeper consideration and study.
The constitutional arrangements in these countries should be based on respect of all the constitutionally relevant groups, on inclusiveness of the different groups living within the
46 Ibidem
47 Stepan, A., Linz, J., Problems of Democratic Transition and Consolidation: Southern Europe, South America, and
Post-Communist Europe, Baltimore, Johns Hopkins Univ Press, 1996
borders of the state and on equality of opportunities. Therefore the forms of ethnical exclusion are undoubtedly in opposition to the democratic principles and one of the main reasons of the certain failure of democracy in multiethnic states are the state arrangements that foster differences between different ethnic groups and the inadequacy of most decision rules and institutions to deal with a deeply divided state.
Therefore it can be argued that the inclusion and participation of everyone in public discussion and decision-making requires particular but intricate mechanisms for group representation. However, when within the border of the same state there is coexistence of various groups that differ in culture, values, and behavioural styles, the perception can also reflect the privilege of only one or few groups. For that reason the principle of equal treatment that can be claimed by other groups, will tend to perpetuate oppression and exclusion. The inclusion and participation of everyone in social and political institutions consequently demand the articulation of special rights that focus on group differences in order to reduce oppression and disadvantage.49
Hence, how states can aim to become democratic and accommodate mainly sociocultural or multinational within its borders? Although the old wisdom and the common perception in the past has taken for granted that supposed cultural boundaries must be compatible with territorial frontiers, at the present time it can be demonstrated that there are some successful multinational democratic states and others that still cannot find the path toward the democratization process and are not able to accommodate the sociocultural differences in order to establish democratic institutions. For the comparative purposes, the degree of cultural diversity of the democratic states could be taken as a variable and according to the level of the diversity they can be distinguished in different categories. With reference to the sub–types of these categories should be taken in consideration not only the degree of diversity but also how rooted is the partition between different groups.
In practice we have several examples of multiethnic countries. Considering their different constitutional arrangement, administrative organization and a level of inclusiveness we have a range of multiethnic countries with different structure and some of them are structurally advantaged countries and others are severely divided societies. In deeply divided countries, as Sri Lanka for example, the boundaries between different groups are reflected on the state arrangement and party system and the partition is rooted in every social aspect.
Ethnic affiliations in these countries grant a sense of belonging, security and “shelter” from “others”. These social divisions are strictly connected with political system partitions and cause extreme forms of ethnic exclusion that requires a legal framework at the constitutional level that is remarkably adverse to basic democratic principles. In such countries democracy is always difficult to establish because in addition the external force who even try to intervene in order to initiate a democratization process have to interfere with deeply entrenched social pattern and establish a political framework within which all groups will be represented. It requires a legal structure and constitutional arrangement that will be democratically, inclusive based.
However, India for example is one of the countries that have been surprisingly successful in accommodating diversity and resolving ethnic conflict through democratic institutions. Every Indian state that is part of the Indian 25 states federal system reflects a prevailing ethnic group. Nevertheless each of these groups is separated in castes, sects, different religions and other socio-economic category. India has succeeded in overseeing multinational frictions by the implementation of adequate usage of various consociational practices. This process allowed to India to become a successful democratic state-nation.50 This example has shown that even in a state with strongly multinational dimension where the population has multiple and complementary identities and where national groups are divided by the lines of a variety of linguistic and religious differences it is still possible to introduce democratic procedures and avoid the jeopardy of partition.
The concept of the state-nation was introduced by Linz and Stepan (1996) and proposed again by stating the states that “are multicultural, and sometimes even have significant multinational components, which nonetheless still manage to engender strong identification and loyalty from their citizens, an identification and loyalty that proponents of homogeneous nation states perceive that only nation states can engender.”51 The conception of democracy itself has had an evolution through the centuries and it has reflected this changes to the conception of the state as well. During the nineteenth century the creation of a national identity and crafting a homogenous state were identified as democratic practices. In the past the nation was identified with the state,
50 Arend Lijphart has intentionally omitted India from his volume Democracies: Patterns of Majoritarian and
Consensus Government in Twenty-One Countries, New Heaven, Yale University Press, 1984. However, in his next
volume on this matter he acknowledged that India is a democracy (in Lijphart, A., Patterns of Democracy: Government
Forms and Performance in Thirty Six Countries, 1999); See also Stepan, A., Linz, J., Yadav, Y., Crafting State-Nations. India and Other Multinational Democracies, The Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 2011
an idea that nowadays in most cases is not possible. The difficult attempts to create nation-states in a multicultural environment show that the introducing of the policy features of a homogenous country in a culturally divided society is rather fruitless and that practises of state-nation are more suitable for such society. Throughout the history there were cases where the imposition of a “common culture” was successful (i.e. France), but today the process of homogeneisation almost certainly would not bring positive outcomes.
In such states that include a variety of different ethnic or national groups that act on exclusive basis it is possible, as Horowitz has pointed out, distinguish two general types of polities: bifurcated polity where half of the state govern the other half and minority dominated polity where one or two small groups lead the majority. In such circumstances where the arrangement mentioned above is rooted it is quite impossible to bring any change to the system because of the opposition of the leading group.52 In this context Horowitz argues about those groups who are living in a territory that, for some historic reason, belongs to another group or vice versa. Those groups who feel themselves as ones who have the right to live on that certain territory they also consider themselves as more privileged than other inhabitants within the same borders. These kinds of circumstances are very frequent in Asia and Eastern European countries. In the last case the tensions between groups are heavily burden by historic reminiscence. Considering that is some cases the history is intertwined with present politics and arrangement of the state, the assumption is that in most cases the ethnicity is very dangerous for the success of the democracy.53
Before analysing multinational states and means through witch they manage diversities, this study requires a specific consideration of what is multinational, multiethnic or multicultural.
3. “Ethnic origin” of nations
In 1882 Ernest Renan emphasized the uncertain difference between nation, race and the meaning of these words. During his speech “What is a Nation” held on Sorbonne he was pointing out as follows:
52 Horowitz Op. cit. 1987, p.19 53 Horowitz Op. cit.,1987, p.19
“I intend to analyse with you an idea which seems simple and clear but which lends itself to the most dangerous misunderstandings... In our day one commits a serious error: one confounds nation and race, and one attributes to ethnographical or rather linguistic groups a sovereignty analogous to that of real peoples. Let us try for some precision in these difficult questions where the slightest confusion about the meaning of words, which are at the basis of our reasoning, can produce the most disastrous errors.”54
From this excerpt is remarkably clear the difference he makes between “ethnographical or ... linguistic groups” and “real peoples”. He doesn’t give any political significance to an ethnic/linguistic group and certainly gives this relevance only to “real peoples” that we could at present call possibly nations. Nevertheless, even if the terminology has moderately changed since Renan’s times, the topic is still applicable to the present time and it requires a deep study on differences between groups with different connotations.
The relation between citizenship, religion, nationality and ethnic origin has always been a discussed topic among scholars from sociological, historical, political point of view. The dichotomy citizenship – religion and both in relation to the nation have been the main issue of many polities even in the smallest state units and cannot be discussed without an interdisciplinary approach. For the purposes of this study it is indispensable to clarify the terminology and significance of the definitions related to the meaning of the ethnic group and nationality that often create misunderstandings in attributing the erroneous significance to one or another. The purpose is to illustrate the relation between the civil society and the state and to raise the question about the inclusion and exclusion related to the issues of assimilation, integration and accommodation of different groups.
This subject is strictly related to the citizenship issue, which is about the inclusion/exclusion in the political community and as concept it has its roots in the concept of sovereignty, which is expressed as the exclusive power held by the government to exercise its authority over the territory. In multinational societies the state arrangement can became very intricate because of different groups who are competing for the inclusion to the community and to the government.
54 Lecture at Sorbonne, March 11th 1882, in Discours et Conferences, Paris, Caiman-Levy, 1887, pp.277-310; also in Eley, G., and Suny, G., ed., Becoming National: A Reader, New York and Oxford ,Oxford University Press, 1996, pp. 41-55.
In some cases, groups can be also represented by historical enemies or national groups that do not accept the actual arrangement of the state or have a lack of identity and loyalty to the state. National borders between different nations, in many cases, are not the same as borders between states. A state may contain more than one national group or otherwise people who belong to a same national group may live in different states. However, as it was previously examined, the main difference between a national group and an ethnic group stands in their political aspirations. A group that has no political aspirations will be considered more as an ethnic group than as a nation and the path to its inclusion does not challenge state unity.
In its general definition, the nation among its characteristic has the “we-feeling” attitude that gather the members who share the same history, culture, tradition and are also loyal to the state and are committed to its goals.55 In case where state’s population includes different groups, having different aspirations, the claims of the groups can arise over territory, administrative autonomies and political recognition. The issue that state must cope with is to decide whether to accommodate or to repress requests of “others”. It becomes a matter of the calculation of the cost of the accommodation and toleration and the cost of the suppression.56 Consequently the question that arises is in which way it is possible to accommodate diversity of groups and, on the other side, what would be the outcome of repression?
Accommodation occurs in territorial federal arrangement and in other practices that give the recognition to the groups as political actors. On the other hand, the cost of repression may be very high considering that one of the outcomes could be secession.
However to understand better the difference between the national group and ethnic group we have to understand their origin. From this point of view is very important the Anthony Smith's study of the formation of nations and their evolution out of older ethnic communities.57 Smith makes a distinction between two cases: the first one is where the nation is based on a single leading ethnic group. The culture of that group, being stronger than others’, is imposed on ethnic minorities living within the borders of the developing nation. In the second case, a dominant culture is weak and has to be crafted with the aim to create a nation out of different ethnic groups. In this case nation-building process is based on crafting similarities among groups, in
55 Stepan, A., Linz, J., Yadav, Y., op. cit., 2011, p. 5 56 Ibidem
particular the invention of a common national past.58 Consequently, ethnicity and ethnic culture, according to Smith’s assumption, is a more genuine form of loyalty than nationality and in that case stronger as a concept of unity. What makes this assumption realistic is that the national identities were frequently being created and manipulated in the interests of those who hold (or aim to hold) power in particular states.
According to Obershall ethnic sentiments and ethnic identity are natural sentiments and they have an emotional and not rational quality.59 Ethnicity and religion are deeply rooted in society and have different connotation and practices, but they are real social facts that the society has to deal with. According to Linz and Stepan “political identities are less primordial and fixed than contingent and changing. They are amenable to being constructed or eroded by political institutions and political choices”.60
However, besides the cultural aspects of nationality and taking into account only its political dimension, it is possible to say that ethnic groups can be considered as an embryonic stage of a politically significant national group that acquire the consciousness of itself as a political actor. Nationalism potentially requires ideological basis in order to form the state. Therefore, ethnicity has been understood as an initial form of what would eventually become manifest as nationalism. Nevertheless the major difference between an ethnic and a national group is seen in their relationship with the state. In this context the circumstances the former socialist multi-ethnic states offer a clear pattern (for example the Soviet Union and Yugoslavia). Some countries born after the break up of these formerly federal states became nearly mono-national state by conferring nationality status to some ethnic groups living within their borders. However the consequences of this policy produced, in some cases, the arising of the local awareness of national identity and provoked the inter-national conflicts (which doesn’t mean intrastate conflict).
According to Gellner and to his thought about the nation-state, nationalism “is primarily a political principle, which holds that the political and the national unit should be congruent . . .
58 Smith, A., Structure and Persistance of Ethnie, in Guibernau, M., Rex, J., (eds), The Ethnicity Reader: Nationalism,
Multiculturalism, and Migration, Polity Press, Cambridge, 2010, p.31
59 Obershall, A., The manipulation of ethnicity: from ethnic cooperation to violence and war in Yugoslavia, Ethnic and
Racial Studies, Volume 23 (6), 2000
Nationalist sentiment is the feeling of anger aroused by the violation of the principle . . . A nationalist movement is one actuated by a sentiment of this kind.”61
However the concept of nation is still an extremely intricate topic and as long as it belongs to the sphere of the highly rooted values, it has a range of connotations that can differ from one group to another. In Max Weber’s theory the sentiment of solidarity was one of the core aspects of the nation concept. The solidarity that connects people of the same group is based on a “privilege”. He asserts that some populations are intellectually privileged within a polity and privileged by their existence. To be part of that group, individuals have to share that same privileged culture diffused among other members and national solidarity is connected to common political destiny. In time this status of being a part of a privileged group and of a privileged culture, becomes converted inevitably in demand of power and into the idea of the nation.62
National sentiment is variously related to political associations and the idea of nation may be used for political scopes of the future state. According to Craig Calhoun national and ethnic groups are part of a modern formation of identities that are used and controlled by elites and other members of the political and social life. He considers nationalism as a superlative rhetoric used to define political communities by claiming the self-determination.
A nation can be defined as a community with certain political connotations and sentiments of uniqueness of their origin which, as Weber was asserting, a nation “would adequately manifest itself in a state of its own”63; therefore, a nation is a affiliation witch normally “tend to create a state of its own”.64 He was not in agreement with the generally accepted rule that the language is unifying element, especially because it is possible, even nowadays, to find groups or nations that speak the same language but culturally differ one from another. Language, in certain cases, can be a significant element in creating the basis for the formation of the national sentiment, but cannot be the only element of identification of the group identity nor a precondition to originate a nation.
In Gellner’s words nationalism is a “political legitimacy” that insist on the same ethnic and political boundaries. However he insists on the theory that the states are not the outcome of the evolution of the nations and also that some nations were created without the support of their
61 Gellner, E. Nations and Nationalism, Oxford, Blakwell Publishing, 1983, p.1
62 Guibernau, M., Nationalisms: The Nation-State and Nationalism in the Twentieth Century, Cambridge, Polity Press, 1996, p.34
63 Weber, M., The Nation, in Hutchinson, J., Smith, A., (eds), Nationalism, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 1994, p.25 64 Ibidem
states. “The state has certainly emerged without help of the nation. Some nations have certainly emerged without the blessings of their own state. It is more debatable whether the normative idea of the nation, in its modern sense, did not presuppose the prior existence of the state.” 65 Along the same lines as Gellner, Hobsbawm has analysed the relationship between nation and state, by claiming that the sequence of the causal direction originate from the state. He argues that the chronological succession starts with state where forms of nationalism develop. Consequently nationalism, supported by the state, results with the arise of nation.66 Linz similarly claims that states develop earlier than nations, considering that the states are the outcome of the feudal crisis while nations develop after the French Revolution.67
The world population is divided into nations and the world system is structured as a state system that is promoting certain values based on the culture of those nations. What can be witnessed nowadays is that the claims of national groups occasionally can be exploited as rhetorical approach to bigger political aims. In another direction the nation with its cultural heritage is used by elites to manipulate opinions of the masses in pursuit of power.
However more than often the history has witnessed and it can still be observed the phenomenon of the clash of nations. The state structure doesn’t correspond to the settlements of the national groups. For this reason the ethnic and national identity becomes problematic. In such an arrangement it is difficult to give the same importance to all claims. The search of power needs the categorization of identities and consequently claims of certain groups will be declared more legitimate than others.
Tilly has put the emphasis on the distinctive character of modern states, and he has stressed the consolidation of the world system as a system of equivalent states with centralized administrative power. This trend is related to the political and social organization of states of the modern era. The problematic segment of this arrangement regards the function of the culture. More specifically it regards the role of the national culture and the claim of those states to be “national” as a matter of right.
A common difference between nation and ethnic group is that a nation is perceived as a group that should be entitled to an independent state or to be allowed a sort of autonomy within the state. Nation is an entity and is a concept that drags with itself other theoretical and empirical
65 Gellner, E., op. cit., 1983, p.6
66 Hobsbawm, E. J.,Nations and Nationalism since 1780, Cambridge, Cambrdge University Press, 1990, p.10 67 Linz, J., State Building and Nation Building, European Review 1 (4), 1993
entities. The speculation about nationalism and nationhood start with the issue what is nation. Even if there is a general definition of the idea, which can include or not certain characteristics (as language for example), but in analysing the topic there is also a difference in academic approach.
Consequently, when a state includes within its borders several national groups which will tend to produce a state on its own or will claim the right to rule, what are the challenges that state have to cope with and how it is possible to accommodate their claims?
4. Nationality and citizenship
Nationality is closely related to the citizenship and sometimes these two terms are conflated. Occasionally nationality and citizenship are two overlapping terms. In its most simple definition citizenship describes the legal relationship between the individual and the state. This relation may have many forms depending on the definition of the polity of a certain state. It is the evolution of the polities throughout the state formation that gave citizenship in the West an institutionalized and formalized character.68
The terms citizenship and nationality both are in relation to the nation and sometimes they are used as synonyms but each term reflects a different legal framework. Both recognize a legal position of an individual in terms of state membership. Generally, citizenship is largely confined to the national, inner dimension, while nationality is used more in the context of the interstate system.69 Numerous struggles, based upon national identity and upon the citizenship issue, were based on understanding of national identity and citizenship as a political, social and sometimes religious identification.70 In this context T.H. Marshall, assumed that there has to be pointed out a great difference between forming one’s identity as a religious person or as a citizen.71 For example one can see this in Northern Ireland where there are clashes of identity that are both religious and political and in this case, as in many others, more than often these two identities are tangled.
68 Isin, E.F., Turner B. S., Citizenship studies: An introduction, in Handbook of Citizenship Studies, London, Sage 2002 69 Sassen, S., Towards Post-National and denationalized Citizenship, in Handbook of Citizenship Studies, London, Sage 2002
70 Isin, B., Turner, S., op.cit, 2002
In commonly accepted assumption Western European countries and United States use nationality as synonymous for citizenship. An individual of one of above mentioned state is a citizen of that state or at least is born under within its borders. On the other side, the Eastern Europe citizenship and nationality have two different connotations. After the collapse of the communism, nationalism and ethnic conflict were a crucial issue of Eastern European politics and identity.72
The French Revolution introduced aspect of the nationality in terms of an ideological approach to the political community. The nation was made of all inhabitants who obeyed the laws, paid taxes and respected all the duties required by the state. Participation in a “social contract” and sharing the sovereignty of the state granted the citizenship. As Renan said a nation is a made by the “common sharing of a rich legacy of memories and ... mutual consent, (sharing of) the desire to live together and the will to live together and the will to continue to emphasize the heritage one has received together”.73 Renan was one of the first scholars to claim that nationhood was civic, based on political community, rather than being grounded on kinship and ethnic origin.74
Some of the countries still hold distinctions between politically determined citizenship and ascriptively defined nationality. France, for example, with its civic, instead of ethnic, conception of the citizenship is still coping with nationalist wing of the population which would like to move toward a more ethnic view of the “Frenchness”. In case of Israel, for example, from the bureaucratic point of view, the proposal that the word “Hebrew” replace “Jew” to designate ethnic affiliation and be employed in a strictly secular sense may have some improvement in eliminating the use of the same word for both nationality and religion, but it will not solve the basic legal dilemma. However, the ongoing practice in Israel of gaining citizenship based on religious beliefs is just one part of the problematic Israeli national issue.
It can be said that “civic nations” which share the same “civic” loyalty to the state assign citizenship according to jus soli (civic nationalism) and “ethnic nations” which found their
72 On this topic see Calhoun, C., Nations Matter: Culture, History and the Cosmopolitan Dream, Routledge, New York, 2007; Chirot, D., ed., The Crisis of Leninism and the Decline of the Left: The Revolutions of 1989. Seattle, University of Washington Press, 1991; Tilly, C. (ed), Special issue on ethnic conflict in the Soviet Union, Dordrecht, Springer, Vol. 20 (5), 1991, p. 569-724
73 Brubaker, R., Citizenship and Nationhood in France and Germany, Cambridge, Harvard University Press, 1992 74 This understanding of the nation as a product of shared identity rather than common descent was instrumental in the development of French national identity. See Schnapper, D. La France de l'integration, Gallimard, Paris, 1991 and Brubaker, W. R., Citizenship and Nationhood in Franceand Germany, Cambridge, Harvard University Press,1992
national belonging to the sharing of the same cultural values, grant the citizenship according to jus sanguinis (ethnic nationalism).
The globalization for example is certainly causing the redefinition and deconstruction of essential principles that are on the basis of the nation-state. As the main formula of determining inclusion and exclusion, citizenship is an essential instrument for the state’s exercise of its sovereign power. Taking into consideration how the citizenship and granting the citizenship to “newcomers” has been changed is an important marker of how globalization is modifying the role of the state within and outside its borders. The tendency toward a multidimensional view of the citizenship would make possible establishing of more significant transnational relations among different populations. As it can be observed, globalization is eroding most aspects of the state sovereignty through increasing of economic (and financial) integration, international policy goals and transnational communications.75 Citizenship remains one of the last bastions to be conquered by the globalizing force.
5. Stateness
In 1968 John Peter Nettl with his article The State as a Conceptual Variable introduces a concept of stateness.76 He elaborates a conceptual approach to the state and advocates that the concept of state is and should be considered as a variable in social science, in relation to the diversity of empirical cases. Consequently the notion of stateness was introduced by him as “conceptual variable”. This conceptual variation is due to the ideological and geographical differences of the realities taken in examination. Conceptualizing stateness, he based his definition on structures and functions of the state and also he defined historical, intellectual and cultural dimensions of this phenomenon. But John Peter Nettl didn’t make a clear difference between two notions: statehood and stateness.
For empirical research and for the aim of this work it is important to clarify the difference between these two concepts: “statehood” and “stateness”. Statehood and stateness connote two different aspects of being a state. Statehood is an old notion and its definition can be interpreted
75 See also Krasner, S.D., Sovereignty: Organized Hypocrisy, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1999; Gilpin, R.,
Global Political Economy, Princeton, Princeton University Press, 2001; McGrew, A., Globalization and Global Politics,
in Baylis, J., Smith, S., Owens, P., eds., The Globalization of World, Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2011 76 Nettl, J. P., The State as a Conceptual Variable, World Politics, Vol.20 (4), 1968
